


Keeping Each Other

by WilliamTheB



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/F, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-22
Updated: 2013-05-22
Packaged: 2018-01-09 08:52:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1143991
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WilliamTheB/pseuds/WilliamTheB
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Willow & Faith are together post-series.  Based on a prompt by daria234 at the tiny_white_hats' Sunnydale High 10 Year Reunion Anniversary Comment!Fication, http://tiny-white-hats.livejournal.com/21071.html, "Willow/Faith or Willow&Faith, post-series they work together well, but she doesn't know what she would do if the other woman went dark."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Keeping Each Other

Willow offered her a protection spell, once. It was actually pretty much guaranteed. No weapon forged (Faith didn't get the reference, it was hard to believe sometimes that she wasn't there for all of it, some things only Sunnydale natives get) could pierce it. Really intricate work, didn't ever use energy unless it had to and it took nothing to recharge but a few hours on a treadmill every couple of months (every few hours if things got apocalyptic, but that was less often).

"Thanks, Red, I'm sure it's great. But maybe you should just send one to B in the, uh, what do you witches use? If it goes through the sky is it called air mail?"

Willow didn't press the issue. She knew why Faith turned it down, for the same reason Willow never gave one to herself. There had to be some chance they could be killed in battle, in case--in case. Fear of death keeps Faith grounded, prevents her from launching in and making it all about the fight and the carnage, now that she has something to live for, keeps accidents from happening when the consequences can get written on her body.

But Willow also saw Faith hiding the battle scars when she came home and she knew why. Willow was good about it, really. As good as good can be. She tried to ignore that she could feel Faith's fists pounding on the walls from across town, even when she was training her own set of slayers lessons about control; she let it all go, tell herself it was a part of the job, closed her eyes and counted to ten rather than let her students see her eyes blacken.

"Every night you go out there, you might die," Willow told the young ones, over and over again. "And someone you love might die. But that's not the worst part. The worst part is that you will die and people you care about will die, and outside birds will be chirping and flowers growing and people falling in love, not even bothering to notice. The world will still be a wonderful place, it just won't be yours anymore."

But as much as she said it, they really didn't know. Willow was pretty sure Faith could handle it out there. But Willow knew Faith wasn't so sure. And she hated herself for it and cursed herself for it...but she also was glad Faith wasn't sure. If it were just her love or Faith's love for her or love for life, Faith would probably have picked a losing fight by now. The thing that was keeping Faith alive was knowing that for all the years they've been together and all the years Willow has trained without an incident and for all her attempts at zen, it was still too dangerous for the world for the girlfriend of its most powerful sorceress to die.


End file.
